Yesterday, I noted the beginning of confirmation hearings for Michael B. Mukasey, George W. Bush’s nominee for Attorney General. The nomination goes through the Senate Judiciary Committee, of which Joe Biden is a high-ranking member. The Attorney General is the nation’s highest administrator of justice, the head of a system which under George W. Bush has come to embrace warrantless surveillance, search and seizure. The Attorney General is the head of law enforcement at a time when the executive branch has been caught engaging in conduct meeting the legal definition of torture. As a Senator on the Judiciary Committee, Joseph Biden has the privilege of questioning and requiring answers of Michael Mukasey before he becomes the next Bush appointee.
Joseph Biden himself noted the importance of the Mukasey confirmation hearings, dedicating a special press release to discuss them:
The key test for me is: will Judge Mukasey understand that as Attorney General, he is the people’s lawyer, not the President’s lawyer? Will he restore integrity in the Justice Department and defend the Constitution despite his own personal views or pressure from the White House? Judge Mukasey’s confirmation process will be thorough and deliberative and I look forward to learning more about his record and background through that process.
Joseph Biden faced two paths, a path that would demonstrate his leadership caliber and a path that would reiterate his disappointing record to date. Joseph Biden could have pinned Michael Mukasey down with a specific line of questioning about Mukasey’s commitment to the law on torture, a line of questioning that looked something like this:
Question 1a. Federal law, specifically 18 USC 2340, includes in its definition of torture the infliction of severe suffering. Do you consider sustained chilling of the human body to be an infliction of severe suffering?
Question 1b. Do you consider sustained chilling of the human body to be torture?
Question 2. Federal law, specifically 18 USC 2340, includes in its definition of torture the threat of imminent death. Do you consider the practice of waterboarding to be a threat of imminent death?
Question 2b. Do you consider the practice of waterboarding to be torture?
Question 3. Federal law, specifically 18 USC 2340A, specifies that U.S. citizens U.S. nationals, and individuals on U.S. soil who commit torture whether here or overseas “shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both, and if death results to any person from conduct prohibited by this subsection, shall be punished by death or imprisoned for any term of years or for life.†As Attorney General, will you order the prosecution of individuals who have under 18 USC 2340-2340A committed acts of torture?
Question 4. Federal law, specifically 18 USC 2340A, specifies that “A person who conspires to commit an offense under this section shall be subject to the same penalties (other than the penalty of death) as the penalties prescribed for the offense, the commission of which was the object of the conspiracy.†As Attorney General, will you order the prosecution of individuals who have participated in a conspiracy to commit torture?
If Joe Biden didn’t engage in this specific line of questioning, one that would show his fitness for the higher office he covets, then I figured he would just sit there and waste time, rattling on in his usual way.
I was wrong. Joseph Biden didn’t even show up to the hearing. Biden’s presidential campaign schedule for the day shows what he was doing yesterday instead:
10:00 AM
SEN. BIDEN WILL HONOR DOMESTIC VIOLENCE MONTH AND UNVEIL NEW INITIATIVES TO CONTINUE THE BATTLE AGAINST DOMESTIC VIOLENECE
Creative Visions
1343 13th Street
Des Moines, IA7:00 PM
SEN. BIDEN WILL ATTEND A HOUSE PARTY WITH WOODBURY COUNTY DEMOCRATS
Home of Thomas Beauvais
21 Gilman Terrace
Sioux City, IA
I do not mean to belittle the issue of domestic violence in any way, and I won’t fall into the trap of prioritizing one issue over another. But Biden could have announced his domestic violence initiative anywhere in the nation. He could have announced it from the steps of the Capitol building with his toupee flapping patriotically in the breeze at 9:30 am in the morning, right before he headed into the hearings. And then he could have had his face in the national news, standing up for American moral values. He could have put our next Attorney General under Bush in a position in which he’d either have had to specifically repudiate the particular torture tactics of the Bush administration, or to conspicuously refuse to answer the question.
But no. Joseph Biden decided he had better things to do than to use his power as a Senator to end American torture. Joseph Biden decided that a day campaigning in Iowa was more important than confronting and ending torture. He had a house party to attend that evening, after all! And we all know house parties have a higher priority than putting a stop to torture.
Joseph Biden could have come back today for the second round of confirmation hearings for Michael B. Mukasey. He could made up for his gallingly misplaced priorities by at least showing up on the second day and delivering the specific questions that (see for yourself) no other senator has asked. But no. Here’s Joseph Biden’s schedule for today:
8:00 AM
SEN. BIDEN WILL HAVE COFFEE WITH O’BRIEN COUNTY DEMOCRATS
Home of Mary Campbell
1920 E 6th Street
Sheldon, IA10:30 AM
SEN. BIDEN WILL MEET WITH CHEROKEE COUNTY DEMOCRATS
Danny’s Sports Spot
1013 S 2nd Street
Cherokee, IA12:30 PM
SEN. BIDEN WILL ATTEND A HOUSE PARTY WITH BUENA VISTA COUNTY DEMOCRATS
Home of Nadine Brewer
423 Geneseo Street
Storm Lake, IA4:00 PM
SEN. BIDEN WILL ATTEND A MEET AND GREET WITH POCAHANTOS COUNTY DEMOCRACTS
Home of Lois and Karlis Jirgens
501 E. Section Line Road
Laurens, IA6:30 PM
SEN. BIDEN WILL ATTEND A MEET AND GREET WITH CALHOUN COUNTY DEMOCRATS
J.J. Hand’s Library
6029 2nd Street
Lohrville, IA
Shake hands, collect a check. Shake hands, collect a check. Smile, smile, smile. All this for a presidential campaign that no serious observer thinks Biden has a snowball’s chance to win. Joseph Biden has the support of one percent of Democrats in the presidential race. It’s not going to happen. And yet he chugs merrily along, raking in campaign cash and smiling for photos in Iowa instead of doing his job in Washington, DC, using his considerable power to end American torture.
I would not be surprised if some schmuck from the Biden 2008 campaign tooted on by here to post a rejoinder. “These hearings are all just theater,” the knowledgeable observer will write. “What really matters is getting Joe Biden into the White House, so he can…” … what? So he can what? Save the Eastern Bluebearded Chicken? Biden will never be elected president. He is a United States Senator now. He had the power to put the next Attorney General of the United States on the spot and force him to either specifically repudiate Bush’s torture tactics or to conspicuously go silent on the matter. Do you think once he is confirmed that Mukasey will ever again answer that question? No. He’ll fall behind the Bush Wall of Silence.
Joseph Biden had an opportunity had a rare, golden, privileged opportunity to help bring an end to the Bush Torture Era. Joseph Biden failed. He didn’t just fail to seize an opportunity to show presidential mettle. He failed us, you and me. He failed the nation.
All this handwringing is disproportionate. Mukasey is going to be approved. Even Leahy said so. There is a complete wackjob in the acting post. If Mukasey is willing to disavow doing waterboarding with his own two hands, he’s probably a step up.
You don’t like Biden, obviously. But in Iowa he has more than five percent, and his numbers are moving up not down. The reason is that whenever he gets in front of a roomful of people, he answers their questions without evasion, he speaks from the heart, and he offers good, practical ideas for solving awful problems. That is more than you can say for some of the other Democrats who are running. That straight answer thing is pretty hard for some of them.
But you need to actually run a campaign in order to get people to vote for you. So you need to make choices about what’s important. A sure-thing vote–not as important as, say, voting against the Kyl-Lieberman amendment that opens to the door to war. Biden did show up for that one.
5 percent! Holy moly. That puts him in, what, fifth place? Amazing. And much more important than the continuation of a policy of American torture.
You want to know why it’s a sure thing? Because people like Joe Biden decided it was. That tells me a lot about who Joe Biden is.
Yes, that puts him at fifth. So either he has to take down Bill Richardson, John Edwards, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, OR he has to show up and bring some accountability and specificity to the behavior of the Bush administration regarding torture. Joe Biden chose the former. he neglected the latter.
What is this – an anti-Biden blog? I cannot believe all the anti-Biden posts you have made.
Maybe if you opened your mind you would know that Biden has proposed anti-torture legislation earlier this year.
http://www.joebiden.com/getinformed/speeches?id=0083
You really should get your facts straight before you make such a ridiculous post.
What factual error did I make in this post? Name it.
Biden had an opportunity to place Mukasey in a situation in which he must either agree that waterboarding is torture, or he must be seen to repudiate the notion that waterboarding is torture. In the former case, he is placed in a position so that as Attorney General
He squandered that unique opportunity to spend a day glad-handing in a race he is not positioned to win.
This is not an anti-Biden blog. It is a pro-Constitution blog. It is an anti-torture blog. And I will not play partisan games of “That’s OK” when a man in power fails — yet again — to use his power in defense of the Constitution and in opposition to torture. Joseph Biden is a man with a lifetime of missed opportunities. Why should I support the election of such a man to the presidency?
Why? Because he proposed a bill outlawing torture? He’s proposed other nice legislation, too. I particularly like his bill on extraordinary rendition, and I said so when he proposed it. I notice none of it is making any headway in the Senate. Not anything besides non-binding resolutions expressing opinons, that is. I presume that is because he is spending all his time glad-handing in a losing race. If you really care about Joseph Biden, tell him that he’s much more likely to have a positive historical legacy if he goes back to the Senate where his current job lies and does what it takes to actually get his legislation moving.
I don’t believe anyone really takes the Biden candidacy seriously. It lends some gravitas to his senate work and gets him on the Sunday talk shows to air some positions. I think he chooses his battles, or more accurately in this case chooses not to battle.
You mean “saves his ammunition.” Biden and the rest of the Congressional Democrats have been “saving their ammunition” for years now. Just in case… what? With what they’ve let through, what could it possibly be that they’re saving their ammunition for?
No, they’re not saving anything, they don’t intend to take potshots at anyone or rock the boat or tilt the windmills or exercise leadership or take risks. They intend to live long and prosper as senators, get lots of pork for their districts and keep getting reelected–while putting out the occasional reflective policy study.
What a giant crock of crap our Congress has become! Voting is about as meaningful to changing the direction of the country’s awful domestic and foreign policies as changing the tires on a car that won’t start. It’s over, people – the government doesn’t work for you any longer. It’s been taken over by the corporate sector and we’re irrelevant now. The election process is to keep us busy thinking there is a way to effect change without resorting to violence, or banning together to shut down the government by either mass protests in the streets of Washington (like millions of people) or a huge number of people refusing to pay taxes for this corrupt government.
Yeah, maybe if you “opened your mind,” you would realize how groovy Biden is.
Man.
Here’s Biden’s latest utterance:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/discussion/2007/10/04/DI2007100401628.html
Can you imagine? A one word answer! And I think Biden might have some real hidden filibuster talent.
YOU are irrelevant, Tom, because YOU don’t do anything but bitch. Did you call your senators? Did you start a blog and tell people to call their senators? Of course not. You have decided that you do not want to have any influence so you yourself have taken yourself out of the loop. And now you, in your gross stupidity, encourage other people to believe they should not do anything either and refrain from exerting their influence. You are poison, Tom. Until you can come on here and say you have actually done something to advance your political beliefs, sit down and shut the fuck up.